Paul Dale's defence during the month-long trial was largely to attack his accusers through his lawyers. Source: Herald Sun

WITH his acquittal Thursday from charges of lying to the Australian Crime Commission, Paul Dale has beaten everything those that say he is bent have thrown at him.

Over the past 10 years he's been sacked from the police force, accused of drug dealing and murder, quizzed repeatedly before secret hearings and lived a life under constant surveillance.

But every charge and investigation against the decorated former detective has come to nought.

He is now free to return to country Victoria and rebuild his life and his marriage.

The jury's verdict was a rejection of the prosecution case: Dale had not been a bent police officer who went rogue to enrich himself.

He did not breach police regulations, did not accept money from crooks and did not have a corrupt secret relationship with the late criminal, Carl Williams.

Prosecutor Christopher Beale described Dale as a bad cop and good liar. But Dale was found not guilty by a 12-member jury of lying to the crime commission.

During a month-long trial, he was accused of being Williams' inside man and of accepting cash from criminals for tip-offs about drug raids. The jury heard a roll-call of Melbourne's underworld figures, and tales of corruption involving interstate and overseas police officers, secret meetings and recorded phone calls.

In the end, the company Dale was accused of keeping proved to be the prosecution's flaw.

Witnesses against Dale included a rogues' gallery of crooks, and his defence team picked them apart.

Dale's wife - "loyal Ditty" as defence barrister Geoffrey Steward described her - sat stoney faced as Dale's affairs were detailed to the court to explain his use of different phones.

All of this to try to persuade the jury Dale had abandoned his oath as a police officer and started swimming with the low-lifes of Melbourne's underworld.

But last week's failed prosecution was small when compared with the murder and drug offences the decorated former officer has faced - prosecutions that were abandoned in the wake of the murder of key witnesses.

Dale's troubles began in September 2003 when former partner David Miechel and police informer Terence Hodson were caught breaking into a drug house.

Hodson gave a statement accusing Dale of being in on the burglary, and the police veteran of 16 years was charged and suspended.

But the charges against Dale were dropped after Hodson and his wife, Christine, were executed.

Dale was charged with their murders in 2008 when Williams gave a statement alleging he had the couple killed on his behalf.

That prosecution was also abandoned after Williams was beaten to death in jail in April 2010.

.Source: Herald Sun

With the murder and drug charges abandoned, investigators took to combing through Dale's 2007 and 2008 ACC examination, looking for the slightest slip-up or lie.

"People who assist authorities in endeavoring to prosecute Paul Dale have got a pretty poor life expectancy. Two of them have been murdered," ACC lawyer Gary Livermore told Dale's committal hearing in 2011.

Were it not for his wandering eye, Dale might well have avoided being brought before the court at all.

In 2004, police were all over Williams, listening to hundreds of hours of intercepted phone calls.

Most of the calls were unremarkable. But one was from a drunken man to Williams. The call came from a phone registered in a false name and had no obvious criminality.

And the call might well have escaped further analysis except the phone had also been used to call two police officers.

Their interest piqued, investigators quickly established the phone had been registered by Dale but under a false name.

When confronted with evidence of the phones, Dale said that he used phones so he could cheat on his wife with two police officers, as well as barrister Nicola Gobbo.

He claimed he had many "drunken escapades" with Ms Gobbo and that he "had sexual intercourse" with her.

Ms Gobbo denies sleeping with Dale.

Dale's defence during the month-long trial was largely to attack his accusers through his lawyers - without taking the stand and opening himself to cross examination.

Despite a torrid decade, Dale has rebuilt his life and marriage in Wangaratta.

With his thick-set yielding to middle age, he recently sold his service station, and is now operating a drilling business.

It is a life away from the crooks and hard-nut detectives of Melbourne's inner north.

There is still hope the Hodson murders will be solved.

Later this year, the coroner will hold an inquest into their deaths.

Detectives want two men - a hit-man and a drug-dealer - to tell police what they know.

If they do, detectives may finally solve a crime that hangs over Victoria's police force as a constant reminder of its failings.

A NOTE ABOUT RELEVANT ADVERTISING: We collect information about the content (including ads) you use across this site and use it to make both advertising and content more relevant to you on our network and other sites.